Dangerous minority vote bank politics
Some influential individuals within the Congress party seem to be infected with dangerous symptoms of minorityism. They seem convinced that if this party which heads the UPA coalition government at the Centre manipulates reservations for caste and religious minorities in education and welfare institutions and in government and private sector industry, it will reap huge political dividends. It is this calculus which prompted Union HRD minister Arjun Singh to railroad the 104th Constitution Amendment Bill through Parliament in December. The amendment adds a new clause to Article 15 of the Constitution which in effect nullifies the carefully considered judgements of two heavyweight benches of the Supreme Court in the TMA Pai Foundation Case (2002) and P.A. Inamdar vs. State of Maharashtra (2005) which ruled that neither the Central nor state governments have the right to appropriate capacity for scheduled castes, tribes and/ or economically backward students or adjudicate tuition fees payable in privately promoted institutions which are financially independent of government.
The new Article 15(5) which received the unanimous approval of Parliament, bars the supervisory jurisdiction of all courts of law in matters related to government mandated reservations in education institutions. However the amendment specifically exempts minority (Christian, Muslim etc) education institutions from reservation obligations.
As if this discriminatory backdoor nationalisation of capacity in privately promoted non-minority institutions of professional education doesn’t go far enough, the Union minister of justice and social empowerment, Meira Kumar has mooted a proposal under which all social and welfare sector government expenditure will be allocated and spent on scheduled castes, tribes and religious minorities in direct proportion to their numerical representation within the national population.
It is difficult to believe that the Congress party leadership is so myopic that it cannot visualise that such runaway minorityism and cynical divide-and-rule politics will re-kindle communal and caste politics and could provoke a massive backlash within the majority Hindu community. It is difficult also to believe that the party’s intelligentsia cannot visualise that such heavily biased pro-minorities legislation will give a new lease of life to the communal agenda of the BJP and constituent parties and elements of the sangh parivar.
It should be obvious to the meanest intelligence that the long term interests of backward castes and religious minority communities necessitate their steady integration into the larger society of a secular state, rather than a sharper delineation of their separate and distinct identities. Yet for all their secular pretensions, the leading lights of the Congress cannot see through the dangerous minority vote bank politics being played by Arjun Singh and Meira Kumar. That’s a sad commentary of the depths to which this grand old party which wrested India’s independence from imperial rule, has sunk.
Second green revolution priority
Following a spate of farmers’ suicides across the country, particularly in Andhra Pradesh (pop. 75.3 million) and Maharashtra (96 million), a national consensus has emerged that agriculture is the weakest link of the Indian economy. At the recently concluded 93rd session of the Indian Science Congress held in Hyderabad, prime minister Manmohan Singh gave a ringing call for a "second green revolution" as the prerequisite of maintaining India’s 7 percent plus annual rate of GDP growth which is drawing hosannas from around the world.
A favourable development which augurs well for India’s 100 million households deriving livelihoods from agriculture is that a National Commission on Farmers chaired by the globally renowned Dr. M.S. Swaminathan, widely acknowledged as the architect of India’s first green revolution of the 1970s, is examining ways and means to resuscitate Indian agriculture completely by-passed by the post-1991 economic liberalisation and deregulation policy initiatives which galvanised Indian industry, especially the services sector. The commission has made five key recommendations — enhancing soil health; water harvesting; widening credit availability at lower rates of interest; improving marketing infrastructure and dissemination of new technologies — for sparking a second green revolution in rural India.
Although the Swaminathan Commission is well-qualified to diagnose the numerous ailments and afflictions which plague Indian agriculture, it is important that its prescription is implemented in the right priority. Admittedly the five key recommendations are interconnected and mutually reinforcing, but according them equal weightage and priority ab initio, raises the danger of available resources being spread too thin — the cardinal sin of Indian planning.
The spectacular success of the first green revolution which tripled foodgrain production within three decades is testimony to the production capability of India’s farmers. Therefore the first priority of the Central and state govern-ments should be construction of an enabling marketing infrastructure for the nation’s 670 million rural citizens.
The gap between farm gate and market prices (which urban consumers pay) is routinely 200-300 percent, especially for horticulture produce. In particular, inadequacy of post-harvest marketing infrastructure and technologies inflicts an annual loss estimated at Rs.30,000 crore upon India’s horticulture producers (and consumers), because 40 percent of the produce of the world’s second largest fruit and vegetables producing nation rots before it gets to market.
Following persistent pressure from liberal economists, two years ago, the Central government passed a model Agriculture Produce Marketing (Development and Regulations) Act, 2003 which is yet to be adopted and/ or enabled by state governments. Forcing state governments to re-enact this Act in their legislative assemblies so that farmers get better farm gate prices from proliferating food processing enterprises, should be the first priority of the Swaminathan Commission.
A second green revolution will remain a pipe dream if top priority is not accorded to developing a large scale food processing industry which is the vital adjunct of a predominantly agricultural economy.